Betting On A Baby: Why Are Interracial Couples Expected To Have “Pretty Babies”?

If there is ever a crapshoot in life, it’s betting on what your children will look like. Sure there are some couples whose children look like the perfect mixture of the parents. Or the daughter looks just like the mom and the son looks just like the dad and vice versa. Some kids, however, look nothing like either of their parents.

This is why you can’t establish paternity by just looking at a child. Sure, some children immediately answer “Who’s my daddy?” the minute they leave the womb, but often it takes years – if ever—for a child to begin resembling one or both parents. In fact, I often lose the “which parent does my child look like” game because, to me, a baby doesn’t look like either parent.

Also, just because a couple is made up of two conventionally attractive people doesn’t mean their children will be attractive. Same as two unattractive people won’t automatically doom their child to be an ugly duckling.

We know this yet people still insist that certain couples are destined to have “pretty babies” – especially interracial couples. I noticed this even before my husband and I were married, but now near strangers observing my relationship never fail to comment on the likelihood that I will have handsome kids. I would be flattered, but I suspect the reason I’m expected to have “pretty babies” is simply because my husband is White and apparently people believe that interracial couples have the best-looking offspring. That’s a lot of pressure for a woman like me who was nicknamed “hairy and scary” in the 5th grade and is married to a man with a substantial forehead.

The popular belief seems to be that genes don’t matter when a procreating couple is not the same race because the children are guaranteed to be attractive no matter what. If I took offense easily, I’d be insulted when people remark about my interracial marriage then say I’m going to have cute children. I want to ask why? Because the kids are expected to appear biracial or even racially ambiguous? I’ve met some drop-dead gorgeous biracial people, but are Black babies not beautiful too? Black couples birth “pretty babies” every day.